Each week we ask a question of our staff and featured writers to learn a little bit about them and gain some insight into where they are coming from.
This week’s question is:
Who is your favorite artist?
Shannon Drake, “I Didn’t Leave Games, the Games Left Me”
Lara Crigger, “The Milkman Cometh”
My favorite artists are the unknown ones: local potters, photographers at art festivals, and painters peddling their work on street corners. Their art is more diverse, less expensive and, of course, one-of-a-kind.
Seth Robison, “Art House: An Interview with Lifemeter Comics”
I have to confess that I don’t know that much about the world of visual art. I was the kind of guy who hung prints of Escher and Monet in his dorm room in an effort to achieve the inauspicious goal of moving myself from Philistine to the loftier title of Poser. So you can see where I am coming from in choosing comic book artist Steve Dillon as my favorite.
Steve is best known for his five years of work with Garth Ennis on Preacher. I mean this in the nicest way, but I had never seen such ugly people in a comic before. In reality, of course, but never in a comic. In the real world there are people of all shapes and sizes, and about the same amount of peoplelook like Superman as actually are Superman.
The characters and locations drawn by Steve in Preacher did not look photorealistic. He made them look real. He captures what the world looks like, and can not only make a great story look fantastic, but he can also make a fantastic story look incredible. That’s why he’s my favorite artist.
Russ Pitts, “The Definition of an Art Form,” Associate Editor
Too many. I can find something to love about most artists and their work. Caravaggio, Picasso and Lautrec come to mind here. As does Michelangelo. Warhol was a fantastic pop artist. He just “got” the art of media manipulation; which is a truly modern art form transcending disciplines. But for all around-favoriteness? I’d say Bob Ross. Because you just gotta.
Joe Blancato, Associate Editor
Rather than a specific artist, I’m going to have to go with a style: impressionism.
Published: Oct 23, 2006 11:59 am